Hockey Rants

Sunday, June 15, 2008

Dare to Dream: Demitra to the Canucks?

Whilst perusing her CanWest propaganda this fine morning, my girlfriend happened upon Tony Gallagher's latest pennings, and had my ears perking by mentioning those magic words:

"Pavol Demitra"

Oh? What's this?

According to Skeletor (that's Tony G, not my girlfriend), new GM Mike Gillis might be scrapping the Canucks' long-standing Anti-Slovak policy and has shown interest in Pavol.

Speaking of deals, there are also stories circulating around the league that Gillis and the Canucks could end up the subject of an NHL investigation if the GM's former client, Pavol Demitra, should end up signing with Vancouver on or about July 1.

While nobody is saying so officially, the word is that at least one general manager -- one would suspect it would be Doug Risebrough but nobody knows for sure -- is going to make a stink to the league that Gillis might have had improper contact with a player under contract to another NHL team (Minnesota) when the Slovak centre decided to come to Vancouver and be shown around by Markus Naslund.

Gillis wasn't even in town when his former client came to scope out the city, but for some reason somebody is telling at least one well-connected media guy he'll ask the league to look into the possibility of impropriety.

But any such contact would not only be difficult to prove, it would have been totally unnecessary on the GM's part.

The hitch? The Wild aren't really keen on keeping Pavol, but they know that his best friend, Marian Gaborik, would be easier to sign to a long-term deal if his BFF was still on the team.

I don't dare to dream about Pavol playing for the Canucks, because I know I'll have my heart broken. It would just be like the Canucks to end up with somebody crappy like Steven Reinprecht or some other castaway.

Labels: Canucks, Pavol Demitra